Peace Camp 2010

PEACE CAMP 2010--a protest camp from July 4th 2010 to October 2nd 2010 where homeless people slept in the City of Santa Cruz on the courthouse steps or at City Hall to protest the Sleeping and Blanket Bans. Currently Peace Camp 2010 is in the judicial phase.
Our goal is education, survival and change regarding the City's anti-homeless Sleeping Ban.
We demand City Council repeal or suspend this law and grant an amnesty for all sleeping and camping tickets issued.

Friday, September 23, 2011

At Peace Camp 201o on July 10th, exhausted houseless people arrive and bed down for a welcome night's sleep as part of the protest against laws which outlaw sleeping at night. Photo by Becky Johnson

NOTE TO READER: Neither the SENTINEL nor the FEDERAL INDICTMENT against Chris Doyon states our issue properly. Peace Camp 2010 was NOT calling for an end to the CAMPING BAN. In 20 some articles they've NEVER gotten it right. We assembled to protest the INJUSTICE of laws which ban SLEEPING AT NIGHT and the ban which forbids using a BLANKET AT NIGHT. We also called for amnesty for past citations. We understand that cities have the right to regulate camping. However, the City of Santa Cruz does not REGULATE camping. It forbids it completely. And this in a City with over 1,000 houseless people and shelter for less than 10% on our best days. Peace Camp 2010 had NOTHING to do with the cyber-attack. We did not plan it. We did not approve it. We had no knowlege of it until it happened. And ED FREY and I both condemned it at the time. We have always been out to win over the hearts and minds of the citizenry that it is WRONG to forbid houseless people the right to sleep at night in a situation in which inadequate shelter exists. Finally, the County camping ban does not apply to the grounds at the County Building, so we were violating no county code by sleeping there. ---- Becky Johnson , ed.

Homeless activist indicted for county cyber attack: Voice of 2010 protests swept up in nationwide crackdown

SANTA CRUZ -- A homeless activist who appears to have been instrumental in last year's Santa Cruz camping ban protests was arrested Thursday for allegedly hacking Santa Cruz County computers in December, federal authorities allege.A federal grand jury's indictment of Mountain View resident Christopher Doyon, 47, appears to be part of a nationwide crackdown on the hacker community. A second man also has been charged in the attack, which authorities say was planned as retribution for the breakup of a lengthy protest over the city's controversial outdoor sleeping ban.According to the indictment, Doyon and Joshua John Covelli, a 26-year-old Fairborn, Ohio, resident, hatched "Operation Peace Camp 2010" on behalf of the Massachusetts-based group Peoples Liberation Front, which claimed credit for the attack and has been linked to the hacker group Anonymous.

Anonymous has been linked to a number of online hacking attacks worldwide, and played an instrumental role in a recent series of BART protests. Their members often appear in public wearing masks, particularly of the British 17th century revolutionary Guy Fawkes.The county government computer attacks resulted in users not being able to access the county's website. No information was compromised or disseminated, county officials said.The two-month protest over the camping ban began on the steps of the county courthouse and ended in front of Santa Cruz City Hall. Ultimately, the sheriff's deputies moved in early in the morning to break up the protest.

In letters posted on Peace Camp's blog, Doyon also described himself as homeless and some news reports on Thursday also described him as such, though federal authorities could not confirm it. Authorities provided no details on his arrest.

"All I know is that it went without incident," FBI spokeswoman Julie Sohn said.

A Chris Doyon of the same age was quoted in a Sentinel article last year about the camping ban protest, saying he believed people had the right to sleep wherever they choose.Doyon was also one of five people ultimately charged with illegal camping, though he never showed up for trial. Prosecutor Sara Dabkowski said in May that a bench warrant had been issued for his arrest, but no further information was available Thursday.Doyon once described himself as a spokesman for the group. At the time, he said he grew up in Maine and moved west to follow the Grateful Dead. He also vowed not to give up protesting the camping ban."This is a fight about aesthetics," he was quoted as saying. "One man's garbage is another man's belongings. I think millionaires are unaesthetic; I think Hummers are disgusting. You see the ridiculousness. This is class warfare."The FBI and U.S. Attorney's Office offered scant information, but the indictments appear to part of a broader net cast by federal authorities.

Also Thursday, the FBI's Los Angeles office announced it had arrested a Phoenix man on charges he hacked Sony Pictures Entertainment's website.Cody Kretsinger, 23, was arrested without incident, based on a Sept. 2 federal grand jury indictment unsealed Thursday. The indictment alleges Kretsinger carried out the attack as part of the group LulzSec, which has also been linked to Anonymous.An FBI official told FoxNews.com that search warrants were being executed in Minnesota, New Jersey and Montana.

Covelli was previously indicted in July for allegedly hacking into PayPal. He was not arrested Thursday, and his next scheduled court appearance in the earlier case is set for November.Both Doyon and Covelli were charged with conspiracy to cause intentional damage to a protected computer, which carries a maximum of five years in prison and a fine of $250,000, and aiding and abetting, which can carry a sentence of 10 years and a fine of $250,000.Any sentence is subject to federal sentencing guidelines.

Doyon made a brief court appearance Thursday. His next scheduled appearance is Sept. 29.

Saturday, June 11, 2011

NOTE TO READER: As always, a careful reading is required of any SENTINEL article about the Sleeping Ban. A good reading between the lines is in order, as always. Not that I fault writer, Cathy Kelly. She is more thorough than most, but conforms, as they all do to a certain...shall I say bias? At issue:

Missing from Kelly's article is that the DA asked for 400 hours of community service from Frey and Johnson, which is excessive. They were convicted of sleeping which is non-violent and has no victim. Also missing from Kelly's article was that Gallagher issued a $50,000 bail should Frey want to be at liberty to file his appeal. Also, the "registered sex offender" was originally luridly called a "child molester" in a previous SENTINEL headline. That charge was later retracted. The man arrested, ha, at age 14 impregnated his 12 year old girlfriend. He is now 27. He does not belong on any sex offender's registry and poses no threat to anyone. While Kelly accurately reported that Gallagher did deny the juror misconduct, he did so by labeling our recordings of jurors saying that one juror did commit misconduct in a recorded interview after the verdict with DA Dabkowski participating. Gallagher ruled the tape "hearsay" and quashed any further investigation involving the juror misconduct. Refused to allow Frey access to juror names or contact information so he could depose the jurors and bring back those charges in a "non-hearsay" form for the Judge. Gary Johnson said he'd be unable to comply with the probation restriction to "obey all laws" since he is homeless and has to sleep at night. "I can't go three years without sleeping."When pressed as to where Johnson could sleep, Gallagher said "You can sleep in jail" and ordered him immediately jailed. The law says nothing about "sleeping in public" and only prohibits "illegal lodging". Lodging is not defined by the law. So Kelly got most things right. Of course, she wasn't there. She must have interviewed Dabkowski later on because she didn't return my phone call. ---Becky Johnson

(my apologies for the formatting. For better reading quality, go to the SENTINEL website and read it there.)

SANTA CRUZ - Two men arrested during a lengthy homeless protest last year on the steps of Santa Cruz County Superior Court and City Hall were sentenced Friday to six months in County Jail.

Homeless activist and attorney Ed Frey, 69, and Gary Johnson, 47, were "remanded into custody" directly from the courtroom of Judge John Gallagher.

The case began July 4, 2010, in what activists called Peace Camp 2010. Initially, it comprised a group of more than 50 who began sleeping and holding signs and more on the courthouse steps. It lasted roughly three months, before sheriff's deputies began warning, ticketing and arresting protestors under a criminal misdemeanor law for unlawful lodging and the protest died.

Protestors included one elderly woman with serious health problems who seemed committed to a cause she ardently believed in, and others who included, one day, a registered sex offender arrested near City Hall.

Without doubt, it was political. Sheriff's deputies waded in cautiously after protestors and others realized that though they were protesting the city's so-called "camping ban," they were actually on county property.

In April, Frey represented himself and others in a legal challenge and jurors upheld the charges against most of the five people Frey was then representing. Friday, he was representing three people, one who didn't come to court, prosecutors said.

And though Frey alleged juror misconduct, Gallagher denied his request for a new trial.

The judge offered the two men a sentence of community service and probation with minimal supervision plus an agreement they don't camp at the courthouse, prosecutor Sara Dabkowski said. But the men declined. Johnson said, given his life situation, he could not abide by the probation directive to "abide by all laws," she said.

So Gallagher ordered the men to jail on the maximum six-month sentence for a misdemeanor criminal violation, Dabkowski said. They will be released after serving two-thirds of the sentence, or 108 days.

Dabkowski said Frey can appeal and has at least 30 days to file a notice of intent to appeal.

She said the three others who Frey represented at trial either did not come to court or have not been sentenced and that warrants have been issued for at least two of them. One, Eliot "Bob" Anderson, was not convicted, as the jury "hung" on his one count of violating the anti-lodging law, she said. The other two are Arthur Bishoff and Collette Connolly. Bishoff was due in court Friday, and was still being represented by Frey, Dabkowski said.

Because the law targets sleeping in public for those who don't have a home, Frey had challenged its essence on constitutional, human rights and other grounds.

After the protest, the city said tickets for violating the city's law against sleeping outside at night can be invalidated if a person gets a statement from the Homeless Services Center stating there were no beds for them that night.

In a July 11, 2010 guest editorial published in the Sentinel about that change, Frey stated that still amounts to "pre-judgment punishing" on top of the punishment of being awakened by police in the middle of the night when one has nowhere to lawfully sleep. The new policy requires "the accused to run three separate errands" to obtain a dismissal, he stated.

"We set our protest at the courthouse for one simple reason," Frey wrote. "That is the only place left where freedom, justice and peace in the world can start."

Friday, asked to comment, Santa Cruz Vice Mayor Don Lane said, "The risk you take when you do civil disobedience is you are expecting some consequences for that. That is part of what he took on here. They were really trying to make a political statement in this action."

Lane, a longtime advocate for the homeless, looks to the day when there is enough shelter to serve that population. But Lane said, "There are other folks who are advocates for civil rights, and that's fine. But that is not my focus. Their goal is to change that law (the city law), and my goal is to get people into shelter."

Dabkowski simply said it's her job to enforce the law.

A public defender, after court, volunteered the information that jail time costs the county $77 per day per person.

Sunday, April 10, 2011

Santa Cruz, Ca. -- The Winter Shelter offered at the National Guard Armory has ended, but those once sheltered now face PC 647 (e) misdemeanor anti-lodging charges, and MC 6.36.010 section a infraction charges for sleeping or for sheltering themselves. Seven individuals face charges and trials in April and May from Peace Camp 2010 where they were charged with illegal "lodging" which is not defined in the law, but left up to the individual officer's interpretation of what "lodging" is. Between 1000 and 2000 individuals in the City of Santa Cruz alone now face criminalization in direct violation of the 8th amendment's prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment. We DEMAND that these prosecutions stop and that those homeless people who sign the waiting list be left unmolested by the SCPD.

Becky Johnson, Editor

Longtime Santa Cruz homeless advocate, Becky Johnson has written for Street Spirit, produced "Bathrobespierre's Broadsides: Civil Rights for the Poor" and has lobbied for homeless civil rights with HUFF, Homeless United for Friendship & Freedom, and produced her own television show "Club Cruz" which covered local and poverty issues. Currently Ms. Johnson is one of the founders of Peace Camp 2010 located on the courthouse steps until the City of Santa Cruz repeals the Sleeping Ban.